Appropriate
by BlueSuedeShoes
Summary: for junigirl: Gabe Sullivan reads something rather upsetting about his only daughter. oneshot
1. Chapter 1

"Dad!" Chloe exclaimed, bursting in through the doors of her father's home in Smallville to find him standing in wait for her. She flung her arms around his neck and for a moment felt ten years old again. She saw so little of her father, and she had missed him terribly. It was a good fifteen seconds before she suddenly realized that the embrace was rather one-sided. "Dad?" she asked sweetly, pulling away slightly.

Gabe Sullivan closed his eyes and held up a tabloid magazine for Chloe's eyes. "Please, please tell me you have an evil twin."

Chloe swallowed tightly. On the cover of the magazine was a rather compromising photograph of her and one, Oliver Queen. Ironically enough, while Chloe and Oliver certainly got up to their fair share of..._mischeif_, the photo that was taken had been of an entirely tame moment. Chloe, ever graceful, had broken a heel and tripped. Breaking her rather wild fall had been Oliver's body, and Oliver, taken completely by surprise, had been caught on film with his hands in some rather inappropriate places and Chloe very much on top of him.

Somewhere in the back of her mind, Chloe was aware of the injustice. She had come home for the weekend for the explicit purpose of escaping the media craze that had ensued in Metropolis following the publishing of that photograph. She was tired of being asked for a quote on things ranging from how long she and Oliver had been secretly dating to whether or not they were exclusive...or, still worse, some of them had been asking her to comment on what Oliver was like in bed. He might be used to this sort of thing, but Chloe was used to interviewing, not being interviewed. She sighed.

"Why on earth are you reading that trash?" she asked her father.

"I'm not," he glared. "Three different people I work with were."

Chloe groaned, moving past him and grabbing her suitcase to drag to her old room and unpack.

Her father gave chase, however, not about to let her get off the hook that easily.

"Isn't this your boss, Chloe? That's hardly appropriate for a work relationship," he scolded as he followed behind her in the stairwell.

Chloe groaned and rolled her eyes.

"Chloe, I raised you better than this! Do you know the article on the inside is calling you his 'flavor of the month?' Why kind of guy is this you work for?"

"I thought you weren't reading it?" Chloe growled angrily, reaching the top of the landing.

"I have to admit, the cover made me a little curious. Not to mention the caption: 'Chloe Sullivan: Gold Digger or Future Queen?' You can't deny it'll draw the reader in."

"ARRGGGH!" Chloe yelled her frustration, having finally reached her room. She turned and slammed the door in her father's face.

"We're talking about this later!" he said to her through the door.

"No," she yelled back, furiously ripping open her suitcase, "we're not! I came home to get away from that circus, Dad. Not to give you an exclusive!"

"That's what you think!" he returned, walking back down the stairs. He'd give her time to unpack.

Chloe was too angry to unpack. She'd already opened a drawer so furiously that she accidentally yanked it straight out of the dresser, sending clothes flying across the room, and bruising her foot painfully when it landed on her toes.

She yelled again in frustration and flopped down on the floor.

Her phone started buzzing in her pocket and she jerked it angrily out.

"What?" she demanded, her voice still livid.

"Whoah! Hold your fire! I surrender!" came Oliver's voice on the other end. "Is everything all right? I called to make sure you got home all right."

Chloe simply expelled a long, vocal sigh in response.

Oliver chuckled. "Less than perfect welcome I take it?"

"I feel like I'm reliving the most angsty part of high school all over again."

Oliver whistled. "That bad, huh?"

"You owe me. You owe me so big. You owe me -"

"Does it help that I'm giving an interview in which I explain what really happened and that you are no more than a friend to me? All for the sake of clearing your name, of course."

Chloe's stomach sank. That _should_ help. That should be exactly what she wanted.

"Chloe?" Oliver asked, surprised that she didn't make some relieved comment when he told her he was caving in to the stupid society columnists. Normally he didn't bother with these things, just let people believe what they wanted, but he felt bad for Chloe's tarnished reputation.

Chloe sighed, blowing the hair out of her face...all of which flopped right back down in front of her eyes again anyway.

"Do you...not want me to talk to the magazines?"

Chloe opened her mouth and then closed it again to stop herself. It didn't prevent the tracherous, "Mm-mm," that came out, though.

Oliver stilled. "You want them to go on thinking we're dating?"

"It's what we're doing, isn't it?" Chloe sighed defeatedly.

Oliver had already formed an entire statement about how he _knew _that was what they were doing, and it had been Chloe's idea to keep it all secret, but he abruptly swallowed it back down again. He wasn't that stupid. "Well okay then."

A faint smile tugged at Chloe's mouth. "I do have a favor to ask, though."

"Anything you want."

"Pack a bag, you're coming to Smallville to meet my Dad," she smirked, hanging up the phone before he could protest.

After all, he said 'anything.'

Standing up, Chloe went back to her suitcase to find something appropriate to wear for introducing her father to her playboy billionaire boyfriend.

* * *

**Author's Comment: Thanks for reading! Please do me the favor of visiting my homepage to take a look at what I'm working on and to give me feedback of what you'd like to see.**  
**BlueSuedeShoes**


	2. Chapter 2

**Sorry there's no General in this. I thought about it, but I liked the clastrophobia of it just being the three of them.**

**BlueSuedeShoes**

-2-

This was good. This was very good. This was...

Okay. It was as awkward as a turtle on its back.

Chloe sat quietly at the table, looking straight across to the clock on the kitchen wall, which seemed to be ticking exceedingly slowly. On her right, at one end of the table, sat Oliver. On her left, at the opposite end and directly across from Oliver, sat her father.

The two men had first engaged in a staring contest, making Oliver feel distinctly uncomfortable and making Chloe wish the ground would swallow her up.

After what Chloe was sure was about two hours, but in reality was only two minutes, her father had begun what he probably believed was an intimidating interrogation. Really, though, Chloe thought it was utterly mortifying. Oliver, on the other hand, sad to say, was actually feeling the intended effects.

"So, you started dating after Chloe came to work for you?"

Oliver cleared his throat. Why was his mouth so dry? "Yes, sir. A couple of years afterward."

Chloe's father pressed his fingers together. "Interesting. And you two thought this was..._ethical_?"

Chloe closed her eyes in horror.

"Well...it just sort of...happened," Oliver explained, glancing at Chloe as though he somehow expected her to help. Finding her less than useful, he attempted to continue. "Working together sort of made us realize how much we have in common." He cleared his throat again.

Gabe Sullivan nodded. "Uh huh. Very interesting." He was silent for a while. "And you sign her paychecks?"

Oliver swallowed. "Technically."

"Technically?"

"I mean yes sir. But...I mean...half the time she tells me what to do, so a lot of the time it's more like she's the boss of me. It's just that my company employs her."

"I see."

Oliver shifted uncomfortably in his seat.

"So what do you do outside of work, Oliver?"

_Aaaaand there it is_, Chloe sighed internally. The worst possible question her father could ask.

"I...um...various...things."

Gabe raised an eyebrow.

"I mean I have several hobbies!" Oliver corrected quickly.

"Oliver is very athletic, Dad," Chloe interjected. _Finally_, Oliver thought. He nodded in fervent agreement. "He's into archery, kickboxing, meditation, yoga...a lot of different things."

"Well that's...good," Gabe admitted grudgingly. He couldn't really find a fault with being athletic. "Is that all you do? Work and work out?"

"Well, no. But my business is very demanding, so I don't find time to do a lot of things otherwise." _Aside from donning a leather getup every night and fighting crime, but let's don't get into that._

"So what are your intentions towards my daughter?"

"_DAD!"_ Chloe gasped, unable to believe he'd actually just said that out loud...and in front of _her!_

"It's a perfectly reasonable question, Chloe," her father said.

"It is not! He and I haven't been dating that long!"

"Well actually," Oliver began, only to be cut off.

"You're both old enough to know what you want out of a relationship going into it. I'd just like to know what Oliver's expectations are."

"I'd just like to say -"

"Dad, you can't just ask him that! It's invasive!"

"I don't see what's invasive about it. Now, that photograph of the two of you, _that's_ invasive."

"If you'll just let me -"

"_Dad_, I thought we talked about that. That photograph was totally innocent. It's just the stupid press. They're always after Oliver."

"Yes, and they'll be after you, too. They already are - which is why it's important to know whether or not this relationship is worth it in the long run," her father added triumphantly.

Chloe rose from the table heatedly. "I am a grown woman, and I can decide whether what I am doing is 'worth it' or not. I don't have to justify everything to you anymore!"

"You are my daughter, and I have a right to know what's going on in your life!" Gabe replied, rising as well.

"If you'll both just -"

"You are infuriating! I can't believe I thought it was a good idea to let you meet him! I thought maybe it would make you relax about this whole thing, but apparently you're just determined to embarrass us both into early graves!" she accused before pushing away from the table and storming out of the kitchen.

"You are just as hardheaded as when you were fifteen years old!" her father shouted after her, storming out in a similar fashion.

Oliver sat at the table, wondering what had just happened, and hoping that perhaps neither of them had expected him to follow. He looked around him.

_This is a nice house_, he thought calmly.

He raised the glass of water Gabe had given him and took a long drink.

_I'm totally screwed._

Meanwhile, Gabe was smirking to himself. _Well, he seems like a nice kid, anyway._


End file.
